Grades K - 6

Norwood Elementary School serves approximately 280 young learners, from kindergarten, through grade six. Below you will find a brief description of our trimester program, along with teacher contact information.

During the year questions may arise about curriculum and instruction. Any questions you have should be directed first to your child’s classroom teacher and then to the principal. General information can also be obtained on the Warwick Public School website www.warwickschools.org that provides links to local and state policies.

The young learners that enter the Norwood Elementary kindergarten program are greeted with a safe, caring, and child-oriented environment designed to help them take the first productive steps to develop as both students and individuals. The teachers lead the children forward with a fully defined, high level of commitment towards the goal of providing, in partnership with parents and the community, a structured and secure, nurturing educational environment that helps prepare their students to meet the social, emotional, and cognitive challenges of their academic future.

Students are introduced to core classroom subjects in a typical setting, but the program is also oriented to provide individual attention to specific needs of the children, enhanced by extra-curricular activities both during, and after the traditional school day. The interaction with both elder students and teachers opens an avenue to insure success as they prepare for future challenges as they progress into upper grades.

First grade classes at Norwood Elementary provide a year of academic excitement, along with achievement, as young students are guided through a new channel of intellectual and emotional growth that helps them to develop a sound and lifelong approach to learning. Patterns of successful and independent thinking are instilled through the community efforts of their teachers, parents, staff, volunteers, peers and classmates. They develop confidence and awareness as they are helped to recognize their own individual abilities, and then how they might apply these unique talents towards becoming productive members and contributors to their community.

The Second Grade program at Norwood Elementary leads our young students into a more rigorous learning environment than they experienced in First Grade so they are able to further deepen and expand their knowledge. Second graders begin to develop their research and critical-thinking projects as they create individual and group work to share. They are taught to present what they learn through different forms, including writing, speaking. The goal is that they become more experienced writers, readers and mathematicians as they practice these skills more, and in more complex and comprehensive ways.

Our teachers provide them with the tools to read longer and more complicated books, to write longer and more complex pieces, and they learn more about the underlying concepts of the math they do. Technology also becomes an important part of the 2nd grade classroom as students learn about and use it more, further facilitating their newly learned skills.

Third grade at Norwood Elementary is defined by the ongoing plan to foster an evolution of independence, motivation, and self awareness, so that our young students both mature and expand their learning capabilities. They are taught to explore the world around them by delving deeper into the academics and disciplines of reading, writing, math, and science.

Our teachers, parents and caregivers, also take it upon themselves to challenge traditional approaches, to encourage a modern and comprehensive academic program that takes advantage of the newest technology. The students are introduced to using laptop computers and learning through innovative interactive smart board presentations. The love of the knowledge is what we want to imprint on these young developing minds.

The goal of the fourth grade team of teachers at Norwood Elementary is to provide a rich environment of learning opportunities for the students. The program places a strong emphasis on teaching critical-thinking and problem-solving skills that students will need to be successful throughout their academic career.

Students will be given the opportunity to learn through a variety of hands-on activities and projects in all subject areas, and will utilize new educational technology including laptops, internet access, and interactive smart board instruction. This approach is designed to enhance the learning process of a general studies track, with specific emphasis in the fields of Math, English/Language Arts, Science, and Social Studies. Our commitment is to help each student become more confident in their abilities as thinkers and learners, and fully prepare them for the next level, both academically and socially.

Our goal for Fifth graders at Norwood Elementary is to help the students practice, refine and grow their skills, and take what they have learned to the next step. Fifth graders build on what they learned in 4th grade by thinking and analyzing in deeper ways.

Our program is designed to encourage the students to be more independent in the learning process, and less dependent on the guidance and support from teachers or other adults. Students certainly have available to them the assistance of a teacher when called for, but at the same time are educated to understand that at this juncture in their academic careers they have been equipped with the essential tools to help themselves, and are ready for larger roles at school, home, and in the community.

The mission of Norwood Elementary School is to provide, in partnership with parents and the community, a safe, secure, and nurturing educational environment that prepares students to meet the educational, social, emotional, and cognitive challenges of the future.The sixth grade year at Norwood Elementary stands out as the culmination of that effort by providing an ongoing setting to facilitate both social growth and maturity.

We encourage Sixth graders to become role models and leaders of the school. They are assigned tasks that help the school run smoother and safer. These responsibilities carry over into their schoolwork, where the goal is to sharpen their overall skills, teach them to remain focused, and complete some of the final developmental steps as they begin the transition to middle school. We want them to achieve great success at independent learning and by the end of the year we want to insure that they will have the tools to accomplish just that.